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Sex Reactions
Taking advantage of last weekend's first-anywhere screenings of Sex and the City (New Line/HBO, 5.30) for junket press here in Manhattan, N.Y. Daily News feature writer Colin Bertram blew off the embargo and ran a spoiler-free valentine review in today's edition.
I talked this morning to a journalist who saw it here also, and if you merge his reactions with Bertram's I'm getting the sense that it's not too bad. Lacking the constitution of a stand-alone movie, perhaps, but enjoyable enough on its own terms.
The dividing line (no surprise) is that fans of the HBO series are liking it more than non-fans. A quick read-through of Bertram's piece tells you he's definitely among the former. But if you read it twice and pick it apart line by line, he really doesn't say very much.
He concedes that the film suffers from "initial awkwardness" but this "quickly disappears" as director-writer Michael Patrick King and his leading ladies -- Sara Jessica Parker's Carrie Bradshaw, Kim Cattrall's Samantha Jones, Cynthia Nixon's Miranda Hobbes and Kristin Davis's Charlotte York Goldenblatt -- "hit their stiletto-shod strides."
"The four women turn in sensitive, solid performances," he writes, although Parker and Nixon "shine particularly bright." Shouldn't that be "brightly"?
The real joy of SATC: The Movie "lies in the return of all those things that mass television syndication has stripped from the series in the intervening years," Bertram declares. "The 'Oh, my God, they did not just do that!' moments, the nudity, the swearing, the unabashed love of human frailty and downright wackiness. Snappy, verbal sparring punctuates the laughs and more than a few shed-a-tear moments."
My source's comments were put more plainly. "No one dies...that rumor about Mr. Big or someone else dying in it is bunk," he says. The movie "is basically the same as the show. It's like four episodes squished into one thing. It kind of works if you liked the show, but I was never a real fan of it." Women journalists at the junket "liked it," he allows, "and...you know, people who like the show are pretty okay with the movie."
I asked if there was any thematic deepening or movie-ish story tension or a sense of completeness -- anything that makes it feel less like a continuation of the series and more like a sturdy enterprise with its own bones. My friend hesitated. "Uhmm...I don't know," he finally said. "It's very up and down. It doesn't really resolve things [in the way that strong films do]. There's lots of funny material. It basically undoes a lot of stuff, and then puts it all back together. Clearly they had a lot of ideas and [the film shows] they could have gone back and done another season of the show."
What about nudity? "There's lots of that, but not from Sara Jessica Parker. Kim Cattrall and Cynthia Nixon do most of the nudity. Nixon has a Lust Caution moment."
Fox 411's Roger Freidman saw the film the night before last, and says in today's column that "it's going to be a very, very big hit. Women wept, cheered. It's the Neiman Marcus catalog on steroids."
"Is it really possible to revisit the past?," Bertram begins, paraphrasing the movie's voice-over. "And will old friends and situations still be as dear to our hearts? Thankfully, the answer to that Carrie-esque musing when applied to the big-screen version of Sex and the City is a resounding yes."
In short, the Sex characters and that robust top-of-the-world vibe they carry around is still warming Bertram's heart. Great...but what does that mean for the rest of us? What could it mean? The answer is provided between the lines, but the general drift I'm getting is that the film not particularly painful for non-invested types.
Posted by Jeffrey Wells on May 5, 2008 at 9:26 AM
comment #1
vansmith
says ...
I'm all over this, not! Do we really need to see Kim C nude on a large screen? How about Big in a foursome with the girls. i see Big at trader joes, he looks like a tall rooster. Hey God bless them Kim held out and they all got more money..
Posted by vansmith
at May 5, 2008 10:49 AM
comment #2
CinemaPhreek
says ...
Movie: THE NEXT 40 YEAR OLD VIRGIN
Location: Smart Tech Break Room
Characters: David and Cal
Cal: You know how I know you're gay? You wrote 11 paragraphs about the Sex and the City movie.
Posted by CinemaPhreek
at May 5, 2008 10:51 AM
comment #3
p.Vice
says ...
Not too bad... if you have a vagina.
Posted by p.Vice
at May 5, 2008 10:53 AM
comment #4
Jay T.
says ...
Oh shit... if it's not horrible I'm going to get dragged to this thing.
Posted by Jay T.
at May 5, 2008 11:43 AM
comment #5
Reedyb
says ...
I suppose this post was Jeff's Vagina Monologue.
Posted by Reedyb
at May 5, 2008 11:48 AM
comment #6
chicbn872
says ...
Ugh...my balls just zipped up into my body, as if they were hiding from something really scary.
Yeah Jay T....you are so right. If it was horribly reviewed, I had an excuse to not go, but if it isn't, well...those of us with wives/girlfriends are completely & totally fucked...worse than normal even.
Posted by chicbn872
at May 5, 2008 11:57 AM
comment #7
Mgmax
says ...
If I ran a movie theater I'd accidentally switch one of the reels with Cloverfield.
Posted by Mgmax
at May 5, 2008 12:40 PM
comment #8
Jay T.
says ...
How much would you pay to see a movie where the monster from Cloverfield chased after the women from Sex and the City? Now THAT's a movie... ;-)
Posted by Jay T.
at May 5, 2008 12:47 PM
comment #9
Devin Faraci
says ...
I hate that I sometimes have a hard time getting into any screenings other than all medias because the studio is afraid that, as a web guy, I'll break embargo. Yet the Daily News can just shit on the embargo as they please. It's so frustrating that so many studios look at what kind of outlet you are as opposed to your outlet's history; ie, I've never once broken an embargo in my life.
Posted by Devin Faraci
at May 5, 2008 12:56 PM
comment #10
/3rtfu11
says ...
Damn I thought they were going for a Fire Walk With Me vibe.
Posted by /3rtfu11
at May 5, 2008 12:59 PM
comment #11
GLee2112
says ...
Kim C naked? Maybe somebody could just shove a hot poker in my eyes. I'd rather see Andy Rooney naked than that flabby skank.
Posted by GLee2112
at May 5, 2008 2:05 PM
comment #12
insidah
says ...
The TV show was always smartly written and suprisingly moving. I hope the movie is the same.
I don't care if I sound gay. I AM.
Posted by insidah
at May 5, 2008 3:27 PM
comment #13
calraigh
says ...
Well, It's nice to see I'm in such enlightened company.Jesus Christ.
Posted by calraigh
at May 5, 2008 3:42 PM
comment #14
MAGGA
says ...
As a straight man who watched several seasons of this on DVD I find many of you pretty silly right now. It captured a certain environment and the zeitgeist of the time, might have kickstarted this whole golden age of TV, it was pretty funny, fairly honest, had interesting storylines, if a little too much product placement. I hope releasing extended episodes of hit shows doesn't become the norm after this and The Simpsons, but I'll give it a chance.
Posted by MAGGA
at May 5, 2008 4:19 PM
comment #15
breadlymoore
says ...
"I hate that I sometimes have a hard time getting into any screenings other than all medias because the studio is afraid that, as a web guy, I'll break embargo."
Boy, now there's something to write about!
It's complete bullshit how papers are routinely allowed to post reviews online whenever they want, while studios and their fanged PR stooges across the country smother online critics and continually try to keep them out of screenings, even when the majority stick to the rules.
The system is completely fucked, and there's no reason while it can't fixed. Why must onliners pay for AICN's sins?
Posted by breadlymoore
at May 5, 2008 4:41 PM
comment #16
K. Bowen
says ...
That may be the ball-crushingly worst promo still in the history of mankind.
Posted by K. Bowen
at May 5, 2008 5:37 PM
comment #17
Drew
says ...
Hey, breadly, go fuck yourself.
We don't break embargo either. Find one time that one of our invited reviewers has ever broken an embargo. For any film. Ever.
You can't. Because we don't. But by all means, keep the bullshit alive, eh?
Posted by Drew
at May 5, 2008 9:34 PM
comment #18
breadlymoore
says ...
Interesting terminology: "invited reviewers." Is that how you snake around arguments these days?
Drew, you need to grow up and face your site's reputation and legacy as the face of untrustworthy and unethical online practices.
Posted by breadlymoore
at May 6, 2008 8:00 AM
comment #19
Drew
says ...
And you need to understand the word "embargo."
If you're not invited to a screening, then you can't be embargoed. That's a very simple concept to understand. An embargo is an agreement between the invited and the person showing the film.
And we've never broken one.
Got it now?
You can cry about script reviews or test screening reviews if you'd like, and if you want to hop on the David Poland Express and call those things "immoral," be my guest. You're an idiot if you do, but that's fine. David seems happy to play that role for the 11th year running.
It's easy to throw around words like "untrustworthy" or "unethical," but I disagree. I don't have to "face" anything, since I think your statements are false. I have never sold out a source, and I've never fucked over a studio when they've shown us something. You'll have to pardon me if I don't have an epiphany about my personal ethics because some anonymous poster tells me to, especially since I know what my own conduct has always been.
Again, though... prove me wrong. Feel free.
Posted by Drew
at May 6, 2008 3:07 PM
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